


Clove

by placentalmammal



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Angst, Established Relationship, F/F, Identity Issues, Medical Procedures, Sapphic September, railroad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-01
Updated: 2016-09-01
Packaged: 2018-08-12 11:46:47
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,752
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7933423
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/placentalmammal/pseuds/placentalmammal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Glory and her girlfriend, Dr. Amari, care for a newly-escaped synth recovering from the Railroad's mind wipe.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Clove

The package woke gradually.

Her eyelids fluttered opened, the thin skin pulling back to reveal bloodshot eyes. Her newly-reconstructed face was hidden beneath a mask of gauze and linen. Doctor Amari’s careful incisions had always healed quickly, but the bruises would linger. For weeks, the synth would look like a boxer, like a street tough, like a woman who’d had her fill of trouble.

And that was just the surface-level shit. Underneath the plaster and gauze, her face might’ve looked like a pile of ground meat, but her brain had been wrung out and shot full of holes. All her memories, all her thoughts--her sense of self, her entire _being_ \--had been scraped out of her skull in order to make room for a newer, safer identity. The synth who had escaped the Institute was dead; the woman on the operating table was a stranger.

The synth stirred and a whimper escaped her parted lips. It had been four hours since her last Med-X dose, and she was in obvious pain. Empathy slithered up Glory’s spine, and she shuddered. A decade with the Railroad, and this part had never gotten any easier. Blinking rapidly, she looked away and reached into her pockets in search of a cigarette.

“Doc,” she said hoarsely. “Doc, she’s waking up.”

Amari sat slumped against the wall, dozing. She woke with a start, lurching abruptly from sleep to wakefulness. “What?” she said, scrubbing at her eyes with the back of her hand. “What’s happened?”

“She’s waking up,” Glory repeated, pointing at the synth on the operating table.

Quick as a cat, Amari shook off her exhaustion and rose, one hand braced against the wall. She crossed the room in three quick strides and bent over the synth, making soothing noises. “Shh, shh,” she said, brushing the synth’s hair back off her bandaged forehead. “It’s alright. You’re safe.”

“What happened?” The synth’s voice was a harsh croak. “Where am I?” She moved as if to sit up, and Amari pushed her back down onto the bed.

“There’s been an accident,” said the doctor, automatically moving to check the synth’s pulse and IV line. “You’re safe now.”

“Where am I?” she asked, voice rising. “What happened?”

Glory turned away. She had seen this dozens of times; once for each of the synths she’d escorted out of the ‘Wealth. It had become almost routine: Glory standing silent in the background while Amari soothed the synth, one eye on their vitals as she reminded them of their new name.

This one is ‘Ella,’ after the pre-War singer who was playing on the radio when they rendezvoused in Bunker Hill.

“It’s alright, Ella,” said Amari, speaking in low tones. “Can you tell me what you remember?”

Ella shifted. Her face was entirely covered in bandages, but Glory imagined that her brow was furrowed in pain and confusion. The mindjob was a dry, loveless fuck, a cascading series of migraines while the synth tried to piece the fragmented, implanted memories into a cohesive narrative. Amari called it _confabulation_ ; Glory called it _utter bullshit_.

It was the same for every synth. Irma and Amari--joint proprietresses of the Memory Den--used patrons’ memories to invent new lives for the escaped synths. The general outline remains the same for every synth: a lonely childhood with two dead parents and an abbreviated work history. But the devil was in the details, and that was where Irma and Amari did their best work. There was artistry in the way they wove details from dozens of paying customers into biographies for the synths that passed through their doors.

Ella remembered a three-legged dog named Leroy. (Kent Connolly’s dog, before the war). She had a shellfish allergy. (Like Daisy). She’d spent time in the Capital Wasteland, had done some work in and around Rivet City. (Victoria Watts, one of the Railroad’s most reliable contacts in DC).

In three days’ time, Ella was bound for DC. It would be a strange homecoming; a triumphant return to someplace she’d never really been. Glory would take her as far south as Quincy, and from there, Ella would join up with a merchant caravan. The caravan would get her out of the ‘Wealth and down to DC, where she could disappear. Start over.

Heat bit Glory’s knuckles. Her cigarette had burned down to the filter, so she let it slip from her fingers and ground it out underfoot. With idle hands, she realized for the first time just how _tense_ she was. Her body was strung tight as piano wire, practically humming with unexpressed energy.

Across the room, Ella and Amari spoke in low voices. Hugging herself, Glory screwed her eyes shut and ignored them. A decade she’d been doing this; it never got any easier.

She had another headache coming on. It was pressure in her skull and a sharp, stabbing pain in her eye sockets. Carrington called them ‘ice pick headaches,’ and Glory had been with the Railroad long enough to know that all the escaped synths got them, whether or not they’d had the memory job. Glory thought it must be some sort of Institute security measure. And wasn’t that just like them, lodging some arcane piece of tech in her grey matter to give her fuck-awful headaches?

Assholes.

Sighing, she reached into her coat pocket for another cigarette. Three days.

\---

Ella’s dinner was chicken broth and cherry-flavored gelatin. Even after two centuries, gelatin was still in abundance in the Commonwealth. Before the bombs fell, the supermarkets had been well-stocked with tiny boxes of the sugary-sweet powder. Two hundred years, and it was still edible, still safe to eat. Boil water, add powder, set aside to cool. Gelatin was eternal.

Glory couldn’t stand the stuff. Amari had kept her on a liquid diet for a week after her own facial reconstruction. Ten years later, she still couldn’t eat it without gagging. The taste and texture brought her right back to the worst week of her life--nauseous from painkillers and weakened from surgery, plagued by migraines, and bereaved and wondering whether she and G5 shouldn’t have just stayed safe in the Institute.

 _That_ never got any easier, either.

Weighted down by terror and exhaustion and sedatives, Ella dropped into a deep sleep as soon as she finished her liquid dinner. Her breathing was slow and even, and the EKG monitor displayed her brain activity as a smooth, sinuous line. Her medically assisted sleep was untroubled by nightmares, and her face remained as calm and still as marble. Glory watched her and lit another cigarette, envy twisting in her guts.

It had been years since she’d slept like that. She sighed and clutched her lighter, swinging her gaze upward to stare listlessly at the cracks in the ceiling. If she squinted, the hatched lines resolved themselves into shapes. There’s a pine tree, there’s a dog, there’s a crescent moon--

“You should sleep.” Amari’s voice cut through her reverie, cool as springwater. “You’ve got a long week ahead of you.”

Glory looked up. The doctor had changed out of her lab coat and into civilian gear. She was wearing a seersucker sundress and a motheaten cardigan, chunky grey wool over lightweight cotton. Her legs were very pale beneath her dress’ swingy hem. Glory stared and wonders how long it’d been since Amari has sat outside and enjoyed the feel of the sun on her skin.

“You _know_ me, Mari. I can’t sleep during runs.”

“You could _try_ ,” said Amari. She crossed the room, came to a stop in front of Glory, and took one of hands in her own. She squeezed gently, her expression somber. “Please, come to bed with me.”

Glory kissed the other woman’s knuckles. “Not tonight.”

Amari sighed. “Come back, then,” she says. “After you’ve gotten Ella safely to Quincy. Spend the night here, with me. You’ve earned a break, you know Dez won’t mind.”

It was Glory’s turn to sigh. “I’ll try,” she said softly. “Things’ve been so bad lately, you know--”

“Try,” said Amari. She pulled her hand out of Glory’s grasp and touched her cheek. “That’s all I ask.”

Glory put her hand on Amari’s and leaned into the contact. If she turned her head, she could kiss the heel of Amari’s palm.

“I will, I promise,” she said, and Amari smiled tiredly.

“Thank you.” Gently, she extracted her hand from Glory’s and dropped down beside her. She drew her legs up under her skirt and nestled into Glory’s side, burying her face in her shoulder.

Idly, Glory extinguished her cigarette and draped an arm around Amari. She pressed a kiss to the other woman’s forehead and pulled her closer. She smelled like cloves and detergent, and her sweater carried a vague musty odor, like wet dog. Glory didn't mind, because Amari’s body was warm and solid against her. Three weeks earlier, Switchboard had gone dark, and they had precious little time together. In a few days, Ella would ready to begin her new life. Glory will escort her to the edge of the Commonwealth, and that’d be it. Good-bye, Ella.

Sighing, Glory relaxed into the sofa, leaning on Amari for support. The other woman reached up to kiss her cheek, and Glory couldn’t help the smile that spread across her face.

“It’s good to see you,” she said, and her voice sounded so small in the dark room. “Did I say that earlier? I wish we could stop meeting like this.”

Amari laughsed “In a basement? With an escaped synth asleep in the next room?”

“With so much shit hanging over our heads,” said Glory. “I just wish we could cut loose sometime, y’know? Do something irresponsible, have some fun.”

“Being with you _is_ fun,” said Amari, nestling closer.

“You know what I mean,” said Glory, irritation shadowing her words. “I don’t know. I just want things to be easy. Easier.”

“I know, babe.” Amari kisses her cheek. “Someday.”

They lapsed into silence. They both know that there might not be a someday for them, not with the Institute and the bigots and the ant-synth gangs breathing down their necks. It was the painful, unspoken truth of the Railroad. ‘Agent’s lullaby,’ Deacon called it. ‘Remember: we could all die tomorrow.’

Glory buried her face in Amari’s hair and tries very hard not to think about it. That was a problem for someday; at the moment, she had everything she wanted in the world. She, Amari, and Ella were safe and secure, and that was enough.


End file.
